George O’Leary denies talk of stepping down at UCF

UCF head coach George O’Leary may be winding down on his career, but he is not ready to step aside just yet. This, according to the head coach of the Knights in a story by The Orlando Sentinel.

“I don’t know anything about that stuff and where that came from,” O’Leary was quoted by The Orlando Sentinel on Saturday. “I never spoke to anybody from Fox or anybody. I don’t have any idea what that’s about.”

Earlier in the day on Saturday Bruce Feldman of FOXSports.com reported there was a strong possibility O’Leary would step down after UCF’s first game of the 2014 season, in Ireland against Penn State. If O’Leary were to step down, Feldman reported offensive line coach Brent Key would likely be handed the keys to the program. Key was given a promotion to assistant head coach in the spring and has been speculated to be UCF’s coach-in-waiting or the most likely internal candidate to take over as head coach if and when O’Leary steps down.

The whole sequence of events would be rare, with a head coach returning and stepping down after one game, but given O’Leary’s age it would not be the most shocking development. O’Leary is on the record for now, although coaches tend to avoid these kinds of discussions in the media as well, so that is worth considering as well.

This may end up being O’Leary’s final season, but would it happen after one game? Hey, maybe he just wants a trip to Ireland?

(Obvious ‘…and when George O’Leary says it, you can take it to the bank’ joke goes here)

cubano76 says:Aug 10, 2014 10:18 AM

“Hey, maybe he just wants a trip to Ireland?” THAT IS SO FRIGGIN FUNNY!!!!

mogogo1 says:Aug 10, 2014 2:20 PM

I can’t imagine this scenario happening unless absolutely everybody was in-the-know ahead of time, in which case everybody would already have known about it long ago. Losing a head coach in the midst of a season is a huge event for a team. Even if the successor was already on staff, that still runs the risk of totally throwing everything out-of-whack. I doubt Key would want to start out his career on a “gotcha” sort of event like that, just hoping the team stayed steady.